[1][2] FHV can be engineered in insect cell culture allowing for the tailored production of native or mutant authentic virions or virus-like-particles.

In addition, the transient exposure of a covalently-independent hydrophobic γ-peptide is responsible for breaching cellular membranes and is thus essential for the viral entry of FHV into host cells.

Virus-Like-Particles (VLPs) of FHV spontaneously form in S. frugiperda cell lines (e.g. Sf21) when RNA2 is expressed from a baculovirus vector and package cellular RNAs.

[10] FHV has been shown to infect medically important genera of insects: mosquitos, e.g. Anopheles gambiae; the tsetse fly; and the Chagas vector, Rhodnius prolixus Stal.

[citation needed] FHV has provided a model system for the study of the emergence and evolution of defective-interfering RNAs (DI-RNAs).